Latin America 2011: Day 11: Tulum
Off to Tulum! Said goodbye to Sam in the morning, then the rest of us piled into yet another tour van and backtracked the 45 minutes to Tulum.
As one of the only major Mayan sites built right on the beach, Tulum offers one of the most recent looks at late Mayan civilization. The location is beautiful as well, causing it to be overrun by tourists, even in low season.
Did a stop at the beach next door for an hour-- also very pleasant, if boring-- then had a horrible stop at some villager's house that they called a "zoo". Ugh. Watching a two-year-old girl begging for money was extremely disheartening.
Lunch afterwards was reasonably tasty for a Mexican buffet, and it was right next door to one of the cenotes bordering Coba, one of the oldest Mayan sites in the region. Coba lacks the spectacular setting that Tulum has, but as one of the oldest sites that had perhaps 50,000 people at its peak, it has a very different feel than Tulum. Overlooking the jungle from a 40 meter high pyramid (Nohoch Mul) is impressive, even the third or fourth time you've done it.
Ended the night back in Playa del Carmen, where we unsucessfully tried to find Josh's favorite Thai place (closed for remodeling!) and ended up at pizza (much better than the Caye Caulker disaster!) instead.